


Consume my Wine, Consume my Mind

by HindsightHero



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alcohol, Drunk Colin Greenmantle, F/M, First Meetings, Like a lot wine, Piper is always in control, Pre-Series, Sommelier lingo and general pretentiousness surrounding wine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-04
Updated: 2017-05-04
Packaged: 2018-10-28 02:58:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10822311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HindsightHero/pseuds/HindsightHero
Summary: Colin takes in a breath, and Piper’s skin smells like she rotates between five different perfumes - each of them Floral. Herbal. Dark. And Colin is drowning in it so deep it’s almost as if the air between them has an alcohol content of 16%.Admittedly, it probably does.(Colin meets Piper after failing his Master Sommelier exam)





	Consume my Wine, Consume my Mind

**Author's Note:**

> Dear Lord this is Pretentious. 
> 
> But oh well. It was an excuse to rewatch my favourite wine documentaries. Also the world needs more Greenmantles fic.
> 
> Sommelier = a trained and knowledgeable wine professional, normally working in fine restaurants, who specializes in all aspects of wine service as well as wine and food pairing. AKA Someone who just knows way too much about wine and makes bank for it.

 

       Colin Greenmantle was an ambitious person. He had completed two PhD’s by the time he was 28, and yet still found himself bored too many nights alone in Boston. Then, a revelation came one, especially lonely night after coming across a complete imbecile trying to suggest a wine for his dinner.

       It was a Tuesday.

       He was treating himself.

       But really, Colin had thought, could it be considered a treat when the kid, zit faced and barely over the legal drinking age, suggested a Gewürztraminer as a starter wine for the Prosciutto?

       No, Colin realized. Definitely not.

       With nothing better to do that night, and not yet ready to write another pointless article on the bastardization of Latin in the Medieval North of Europe, he researched what it took to become a Sommelier.

       In those late hours, to him, it seemed easier than a third PhD. And remarkably more fun. He would get to drink wine, critique other people’s choices, and be entirely in control of people’s food choices. It was ideal. Besides, wine was an increasingly good investment.

       In the months that followed, he in fact, invested too much money in wine tasting, training, and masculine bitch fests full of one-up-manship and poetics like 'Its tastes of red currant and spices' and 'It’s day bright, medium viscosity, acid medium plus, and tastes like someone pissed on rocks and shoved it up a garden hose.'All followed by the elegant act of spitting into a silver bucket.

       It had been an all consuming passion, and Colin Greenmantle was the sort of man that really needed one. His remarkable brain that was officially bored of French, German, Latin, and Proto-Indo European nonsense, could now, actually be applied to something beneficial.

       Memorizing the wine regions of France had been easy enough, and it meant that he was naturally permitted to treat himself to a tour of the regions in person, lapping up sun in the oldest of vineyards and the hills of Côte d'Or. The same of course, went for Italy, Brazil, and California. And, dare he say it, Colin became quite a voracious collector. Making it a mission, strictly for training purposes, to taste and catalogue every sought after vintage possible. The bottles which sat in musty old cellars, caked in mold and dust and worth more a pop than the average sum of a Millennial's college debt.

       Oh, he _relished_ in it.

       And his tongue was better than half the idiots who dared to attempt the task anyways.

 

       So at last the fateful day came, just shy of his 31st birthday where Colin Greenmantle presented himself in his best attire, well preened, and with a polished grin, to a panel of judges in hopes of achieving a small, red metal lapel pin that would deem him a Master Sommelier. He had passed three other exams already, and this was the final step. Then, maybe he could move onto something else. Because while his French was for once remarkably useful, his Latin was getting rusty. It was about time to move on to greener pastures. Maybe something darker but still dusty that he could turn a profit in. Antiques perhaps.

       The Master Exam that determined Sommeliers came in three parts, divided into two.

       The first, Theory, was where most people went into the room already sweating buckets and then, later that night, cried themselves to sleep among the scent of failure because they dared to forget the name of a vintner from 1863. Colin, however, rattled off answers to questions no one ever considered they could even be asked about wine. Specific vintages, vineyards and more from dozens of memorized maps.  His pronunciation was on point, his charm superb and his answers sharp.

       A child’s game.

       With a 10% pass rate.

       But it gave him a ticket to the second portion.

 

       Practical, was just a matter of tasting the wine, making a believable face, and sounding assured as he recited what was probably one of the strangest vocabulary lists in the world in the span of fifteen minutes. They didn’t tell him how many he got right. If his calls on the three reds and three whites were accurate. But if the stressed faces, hunched over their cigarettes and the whispers in the hotel bar after were any hint, Colin believed he did more than just fine.

 

        But then, it was Service...

       Fucking Service.

  
       Colin stared down as his chest and frowned. Earlier everyone had gathered to meet privately with the administers to learn their results. He had watched cheap suit after cheap suit skulk out of the small little room with a growing sense of schadenfreude.

       Now, the award ceremony is over. His shirt is disheveled and regrettably pinless, and he is suffering the consequences of downing four glasses of an 02’  Bollinger Champagne in 60 seconds flat in front of one of the judges. All without describing, or cherishing the flavor for so much as a millisecond—  just to watch the light die from the old man’s eyes.

       And now it has left him lounged about in some cheap but at least visually pretentious leather couch in the Hotel’s event space.

       “Finally,” says a female voice from over near the piano. “Someone who realizes what an absolute joke this entire thing is.”

       In her delicate, pink nailed and pointed fingers, the woman is holding a glass of red wine, and Colin watches as she swirls it once, eyes him, and finishes off four ounces of Burgundy like it’s lemon water.

       It is oddly enchanting. Even as she puts the glass down on the top of the baby grand, Colin’s eyes focus solely on the ring of pink lipstick left clinging to the rim. They lingered a bit too long, and she catches him.

       “You’re pathetic.”

       He frowns. No, never mind, Colin decides as he sits up and glares. She isn’t charming in the least.“They’re idiots.”

        “Mm, I don’t disagree.”

       Colin’s eyes narrow. “Did you take the exam?” he asks. He doesn’t think so. He would have remembered seeing a girl like her in all the time they did waiting about, but his memory is a little fuzzy right now.

       “Ugh. No. My father is here doing business and I got bored.”

       “This... is a closed event.”

       “I’m aware.”

       “And you didn’t care.”

       “Not a bit.”

       “Bold.”

       “I don’t like being bored,” she says, and he believes her. “So, what, did you fail? All of it? Because you look like someone who failed all of it.”

       “I didn’t _fail_ anything.”

       “Oh, sorry, is your pin hiding in your pocket then? Keeping it safe? Or, maybe you just decided to be one of those weak people who think it’s rude to brag.”

       Colin wants to sink back into the cushions, but doesn’t allow it. His head is sloshing about. Her presence is pulling him forward. “Believe me, If I had a pin it would be so close to those judges cornea it could scratch it.”

       For a moment, Colin worries he has drunkenly gone too far. That his well rehearsed rich-boy censor has slipped. But something about the woman’s posture seemed to change at the cruel tone in his voice, and it is... not bad.

       “I failed Service,” he confesses.

       Piper fights what would be a snort if she weren’t above such a thing. Instead, she keeps her lips tight.

       “They requested a New World Muscadet Sèvre et Maine for a main course that was Sausage with a Sage cream sauce and Sweet Potato Ravioli,” Colin explains in complete disbelief. “Then asked if I could chill it. The idea itself is offensive. What next, Syrah with Tilapia and Mango Salsa? Fucking _absurd_.”

       Disgust oozes from his voice in a deep and vibrating tone that, though ordinarily nothing special, is enough for Piper to be intrigued. Especially when it comes in combination with with the dark hair and cheekbones highlighted by his flushed cheeks. Whoever this man was, Piper decides, he is easily the most attractive person in a room otherwise filled with sweaty middle aged men in ill-fitting suits.

       “How _dare_ they,” says Piper as she leans gracefully against the piano. She grabs another glass from a waiter as he offers it.  “What did you do to them?”

       Colin frowns as the waiter brushes him off, and then waits to answer until after he has disappeared.

       “Well, first I told them Muscadet is a wine overwhelmingly confined to the Loire Valley and if they wanted New World it would be limited to the Willamette or Puget sound, but they had been shit for the last few years so to not even bother.”

       “And?”  
  
       “They _still_ insisted on New World.”   
       
       “Tragic.”  
  
       “Beyond.”  
  
       “But you’re holding back,” she says. “That doesn’t seem like enough to fail you.”  
  
       “Oh. No. It wasn’t.”

 

       Colin makes a face that suggests whatever followed the exchange was not the proper course of action for anyone who might have been hoping to serve wine to anyone, at any point, ever. It was a face that suggested the shattering of glassware, and indelicate insults to the tongues of old rich white men.

       Perhaps it is the wine, but the sight of it almost makes Piper feel like she could laugh.

       “They’re fucking idiots,” Colin says again, and his body slouches just a hair more against the couch. “That’s the point,” he tells Piper, and also himself, just under his breath. “To tell people what to drink. Why get mad when they know I’m right? That’s the... The whole fucking point.” He sighs. “Who cares if the corkscrew is stuck in the table anyways. It’s not like it’s an antique.”

       “You’re cute.” says Piper suddenly, as if she has been keeping a score behind her perfectly winged eyeliner for the last five minutes, and with the last line, he has managed a small victory. He looks at her.

       “I know,” says Colin. “You’re stunning.”

       “I know.”

       “My name is Colin. Greenmantle.”

       “That’s an odd name.”

       “And you are?”

       “Going to have to wait to find out.”

 

 

\-------------

 

       Hours later, Colin is taking in a breath, and Piper’s skin smells like she rotates between five different perfumes - each of them Floral. Herbal. Dark. And Colin is drowning in it so deep it’s almost as if the air between them has an alcohol content of 16%.

       Admittedly, it probably does.

       Beneath his half drunken fingers her skin is supple and pink. Warm and toned in a way that confirms every suspicion his brain could previously muster about her level of self involvement. This close, pride is dripping from her lips so elegant and alluring it makes his already beaten and defeated heart _keen_.

       The hotel bed is not the best. It isn’t a five star, but it is decent. More comfortable than the couch. Pushing him backwards and onto the mattress had been easy, and Colin knew it. Between the two of them, they had easily consumed two bottles of whatever could be stolen from the test administer’s hotel room.

       She had dared him.

       Colin decided it was a dare worth taking.

       He had not been entirely wrong.

        But now, he is decidedly drunk, and the hem of Piper’s satin dress is lifting. Inching further up by the pull of her’s very own hands, and within seconds Colin is pinned to the offensively low thread count of the comforter, with those exact same attractive fingers, and straddled by a pair of curved and Pilate toned thighs.

       She eyes him like a wolf in a hen house.

 

       “I’m telling you this now, and you better remember it. You have only one chance to please me.”

       Colin’s mind races. Her control is steady. “And if I do?”

       “I don’t like ifs.”

       He swallows. “Good. Neither do I.”

 

       Somewhere within him, Colin’s muscles find themselves enough strength to push against her grasp, and break free before reaching out to grab Piper by the arms and flip her onto her back. It is a smooth motion, a liquid motion, and he is admittedly impressed with himself. Or he would be, if he weren’t distracted by the sight below.

       Her facade broke, for a fraction of a second Piper’s eyes have gone wide in surprise, an expression lovely enough to convince Colin he would do just about anything to see again. However, her face soon morphs back into a displeased scowl and Piper’s legs promptly rise to hook around his waist.

       And then, just like that,  he is on his back again, thanking God and his bank account for the fact he had the foresight to rent a King size bed for the night. Otherwise Colin had no doubt that his skull would most certainly be on the floor.

       “Now, _Colin_ ,” says Piper as she leans over him, power regained and golden locks cascading down her neck and over her breasts. “That wasn’t very nice.”

       The way she spoke made his name seem petulant. Childish, and possibly, for the first time in his life Colin Greenmantle did not care that he was being spoken down to.

       In the morning he would.

       But not then. Not with the edges of her perfectly highlighted hair making it impossible to look away from where the blush colored lace of her bra is peaking through her dress. How Piper’s small but respectable cleavage is threatening to leap out and smother him.

       When Colin breaks free of her grip once more, his arms reach out to her waist. To take hold of the satin in her dress as it clings to every curve in her body, and he lets his hands hold Piper firmly, with his thumbs pressed into her skin.

       She arches against them, and then sinks her body down to meet his.

       The way Piper kisses him is all consuming. It’s sweeter and softer than every woman he’s ever kissed before, but ten times as powerful and focused. So when her breasts press against his chest and her thighs slide against his own, Colin moans into her mouth, and she promptly pulls away.

       “Your breath is terrible,” she says.

       “My breath,” says Colin, trying not to slur. “Has an approximate net worth of 50 dollars an exhale right now.”

       When Piper resumes the kiss, it almost feels as if it’s been rehearsed  and is not in fact the first time. Each of them know precisely what to do to illicit a response, as if it is a slow and tortuous game. But she is giving him her attention in a way that says he is something worthy of it, and Colin, in turn, does the same for her.  
  
       Both, cannot help but be surprised.

 

       After a few more languid minutes of this, Piper comes to the conclusion Colin is the kind of man who enjoys the sound of his own moans, and she wonders how much of his vocality is a result of the wine, or herself. She decides to test it by rolling her hips down to meet his, while she takes his bottom lip into her mouth and tugs.

       And it’s pleasing, Piper thinks, how he sounds like he’s being murdered. And even more pleasing how Colin’s hand moves into her hair to force her closer, and just a bit frantic yet strong. He is a man who is used to having control, and she intends to rip it from him.

       Because it’s almost cute that Colin keeps trying to gain the upper hand in this. How this boy thinks he has a choice in when their lips part, or how their bodies fit. But Piper keeps every bit of the control, and when his hand tries to snake its way between her legs, Piper thinks it’s about damn time, and reaches down to encourage him.

 

  
\---------------

  


       “Colin, what’s the worst thing you ever done for wine?” She asks only after a considerable amount of work, and he has proven himself further and succeeded at giving her an orgasm.

       The question catches Colin off guard. But he doesn’t hesitate. The answer easily springs off his tongue like he was replicating an exam response for the fortieth time.

       “I once hired a man in Rouen to crash into a competitor’s car the same day of a private estate auction. It was for a case of 1990 Ponsot Clos de la Roche.”

       “Is that all?”

       “Well, and a bottle of 1949 Roumier Bonnes-Mares.”

       Piper pauses, and then rolls herself onto her side to stare at him, seemingly intrigued. “What happened?”

       “I won the auctions of course,” Colin says with perhaps too much pride. Then he stops, and as if it is a second thought he asks, “Or did you mean the man?”

       Something devious tugs at the corner of Piper’s mouth, Something pleased, and slowly she pulls him closer into another kiss, their lips hovering as she speaks, “Well, look at you…”

       It’s a dangerous grin, but Colin misses the sight of it entirely. Instead he is helpless as he feels the shape of her lips pressing against his own like a rare and well sharpened thing.

       It is later still, when Piper Laumonier finds herself enjoying, more than at any other point in her life, the sensation of her back being pressed into a hotel bed. All because of this idiot on top of her. It's a nice change of pace, she thinks, from the other men she's tried dating.

       He's still a bit drunk, which is endearing, and she wishes she could chalk that idea up to the fact she is also drunk, but unfortunately, Piper realizes she is not.

       At least not enough to cloud her standards. And he has managed to pass every one of her tests. Every one of her  signals and way out of a bad one night stand.

       On the surface he has the features anyone would find charming, and Piper thinks  if this is the sight of him at his absolute worst, then the foundation at least is attractive, and most definitely something she can work with.

       Even with his pants off, she is less disappointed than expected.

       He also seems oddly comfortable with having his pant’s off. But that, perhaps, is a thought for later. A time when her dress is not wrinkling on the floor and she is not staring at him pull a condom from her purse.

 

\-----------

 

       “What’s the worst thing you would do for wine?” Piper asks him in the morning.

       Her hair is dripping down her skin, and her arms are holding onto the Egyptian cotton of the hotel towel wrapped tightly around her body. But, Colin realizes, she has not left. She stole his shower, and from the smell of it, his custom shampoo, but she has not left.

       And he is pleased to find that she looks even better when he’s sober.

       “I already told you about Rouen,” he says after stretching. It’s a proud display of muscle which she only gives a half second’s glance.

       “I didn’t ask what you’ve _done_ , I asked what you would do.”

       Colin considers it, and then shrugs. “It depends.”

       “On?”

       He wants to think, to answer her properly, but Piper is slipping on her lingerie, and moving her body in a way that is entirely too distracting.

       “Who it’s for.”

       She catches his again, and sighs. “You really are pathetic.Fine then, What’s the worst thing you would do for _me_?”

       Finally Colin tosses the hotel comforter off of himself to stand, and make his way over. “What would you _want_ me to do?”

       She thinks, and does not let her eyes drift.  “Sell the entirety of your cellar.”

       He laughs. “Never.”

       “You disappoint.”

 

       Piper pulls up her dress and then turns, not even motioning to ask him to zip her up. But he does anyways.

       “What’s your favourite wine?”

       She takes a moment to think. “If you plan on trying to impress me with a bottle, don’t bother. It’s impossible.”

       “Nothing’s impossible if you know where to look.”

       Piper considers it. Possibly longer than she should. “Alright. It’s a 1961 Romanée-Conti from Côte de Nuit.”

       “I know where Romanée-Conti is from.”

       She shrugs, and pull away from him as he leans closer to try and capture another kiss.

       “What, Are you not going to suggest something better?”

       He grins. “No. Somehow, I think Rothschild is too cheap for you.”

       “You’d be right.”

       “It’s a shame the 61’s haven’t appeared on the market in years.”

       “Sounds like that's your own problem. But if you can’t do it—”

       “Now what was it I said about ifs ?”

 

       Piper finishes placing the diamond stud of her earring, and then begins to gather her purse. The motions leave Colin standing there, naked, and waiting with hangover dangerously catching up to him. He considers asking something else. Or making a move to kiss her. Sometimes he thinks, that works. But Piper is very different, and for once, he is unsure.

       So he waits.

       Until her lipstick is perfect, and she answers.

        “Alright Colin Greenmantle. I’ve decided your one chance has not ended yet,” Piper tells him, as she goes over to the desk and writes something down on the stationery.“If you can find me a bottle of my favourite wine, then maybe what happened last night can happen again. "

       Colin watches as she rip the paper from the pad, and steps over to hand it to him. Then, she turns for the door, stopping only at the threshold.

        "Oh, but if you fail, don’t even bother trying to call”

  


\---------------

  


       It is the end of March when Piper’s chauffeur pulls up outside of her Los Angeles apartment, and when she open the door to get inside, it takes her a moment to realize she is not alone.

       And then another moment to see the glint of the California sun bouncing off of six, green glass bottles of 1961 Romanée-Conti, and one very charming, well dressed man in the middle of them.

 

       “What’s this?” she asks, doing her best to sound as displeased as she is surprised.

       “You’re favourite, of course.”

       “I asked for one bottle.”

       “You did,” says Colin.

       “There are six.”

       “Call it... interest.”

       Piper raises an eyebrow, and doesn’t let her hand move from it’s grip on the car door. Around her, cars are backing up, beginning to protest, but she elects to ignore them.

       “For what?”

       “For all the months I made you wait.”

       It’s oddly enchanting, and Piper nearly smiles. It was an atrocious business tactic. “One bottle alone should have taken you years.”

       “Oh I know,” he tells her. “I actually knew it the second you told me. In fact, I’m almost certain you would never drink this wine considering you seem to favor Napa Cabernet Sauvignons from years with enough pepper and gunpowder to choke out a civil war general. In fact, I‘m certain you told me this to ensure I’d never talk to you again. Which, really, was quite rude.”

       She wonders how he knew her taste in wine.

       She also wonders why this detail was even impressive to her. Perhaps he spoke to her friends. Perhaps he saw it on her credit card statements. Perhaps she had underestimated Colin Greenmantle after all.

 

       “Then why did you bother?”

       Colin shrugs. “I suppose I just can’t resist a good hunt.”

       “Is that all?” she asks him. “Just the hunt?”

       He looks at her knowingly. “It’s possible there’s something more.”

       Finally, with a twenty car pile up eyeing the white of her Chanel skirt, Piper at last permits herself to settle into the seat, and the car takes off. A foot away, Colin is sitting in a pair of obnoxiously colored chinos looking all too pleased with himself.

       “So,” she asks. “How did you manage six bottles of an impossible vintage?”

       “I have my connections.”

       “Connections?”

       “That and, a very lucky, not entirely natural heart attack.”

       “I see.”

       “Are you impressed?” he asks. “Because I would be impressed.”

       “Potentially.”

       “Then tell me _Piper_ ,” Colin begins, and Piper watches as his fingers wrap around the bottle’s neck, and he twists the sharp end of a screw into the cork. Then she waits, and takes in his confidence as Colin pops it, and begins to pour smoothly in the jostling confines of the car. “Since I think it’s quite impossible that I’ve ruined my first chance as much as you seem to have hoped that I would, I assume you will try again. So, what is it I shall I try and fetch for you next?”

       Piper can smell the wine, and how he has probably had the foresight to try and pair it with his cologne, and she thinks, perhaps, Colin Greenmantle is even better sober. And so, Piper concedes herself to the possibilities and grabs hold of the glass, and takes a sip of a vintage that makes her think of two dozen wines she would like much better.

       “Well?”

       “Well Mr.Greenmantle, “ she says at last. “How do you feel about haunted dolls?”

       “How do you feel about Boston?”

  


**Author's Note:**

> The Colin being a Somm out of boredom thing is a pointless headcanon but one I will fight people on, because I mean, look at him. 
> 
> Please comment if you agree. Or comment if you do not. Or comment if you just want to know more about wine.


End file.
